Haitian PM: Human Organs Are Being Trafficked In Aftermath Of Quake (VIDEO)

03/30/2010 05:12 am ET
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Updated
May 25, 2011

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On CNN last night Haitian Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive talked to the network's Christiane Amanpour about the unsettling reality of trafficking of human organs from victims in the wake of the earthquake that struck a few weeks ago.

"A lot of organizations - they come and they say there were children on the streets," Bellerive said. "They are going to bring them to the States -- we have already reports of trafficking, even of organ trafficking."

AMANPOUR: And do you know for sure that children are being trafficked now?

BELLERIVE: There are children trafficking for children and adult persons, also. Because they need
all types of organs.

AMANPOUR: No, but I mean live children. Are they being trafficked now?

BELLERIVE: The reports I receive; yes.

As TIME reported, the fact that vulnerable children in Haiti are the target of predators is something many organizations are concerned about:

Pean isn't the only one concerned. Haitian Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive on Tuesday expressed the fear that amid the clamor to airlift Haitian orphans out of the devastated country to waiting adoptive parents in the U.S. and Europe, others are being trafficked. The U.N. says it's on alert to prevent the exploitation of the thousands of Haitian kids who've lost or been separated from their parents and who wander aimlessly in search of food, water and shelter. UNICEF, the U.N.'s child advocacy arm, as well as groups like Save the Children and the Red Cross, say they're registering at-risk kids and setting up shelters exclusively for them. Says one UNICEF official monitoring reports of scenes like the one witnessed by Pean, "Traffickers fish in pools of vulnerability, and we've rarely if ever seen one like this."